Richard Neustadt

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Can Clinton Govern?: Richard E. Neustadt On the Shoals, Nearing the Rocks: Walter Dean Burnham Two Views from Pennsylvania Ave.: Walter F. Mondale The 1994 Solution: James MacGregor Burns In Search of a Governing Party: Richard M. Valelly Give the Man a Chance: Jim Wright CAN CLINTON GOVERN? R ichard E. N eustadt T he "Hundred Days" of l933 was bound to be a thoroughly misleading analogy for Bill Clinton's early months in office. The fact that he himself appeared to think it good and played it up right after his election testifies to a surprisingly naive streak in his make up (and his staff's), foreshadowing successive missteps in media and public relations. For l993 had little in common with Franklin Roosevelt's situation 60 years before. Then, the country's banks were failing, the farm economy was in collapse, a quarter of the non-farm labor force was unemployed, while both prices and consumption were spiralling down. The emergency was patent, national, immediate, and so perceived...

Editors' note: On September 15, 1960, Richard Neustadt, then a professor of government at Columbia, wrote a bold memo to candidate John F. Kennedy on issues for the anticipated transition. His memo, the first of a series, was subtitled "A Tentative Check-List for the Weeks Between Election and Inaugural." Professor Neustadt drew on ;his own insights from his influential book, Presidential Power , which had been published the previous April. Today, Neustadt continues to teach, at Harvard's Kennedy School. The memo, never before published, remains a classic. Depending on events in November it may take on new relevance. 1. The Problem of Another "Hundred Days" One hears all over town about "another Hundred Days" once Kennedy is in the White House. If this means an impression to be made on Congressmen, bureaucrats, press, public, foreign governments, the analogy is apt. Nothing would help the new Administration more than such a first impression of energy, direction, action, and...